A tribute to Marine and his selfless ‘duty’

Credit: Unknown

Perhaps you, too, have seen the piece on Swifty that’s been sweeping the Internet lately, regarding the death of this Screaming Eagle from the 101st Airborne Infantry whose parachuting into Normandy was highlighted on HBO’s “Band of Brothers” episodes.

The email’s author, noting the enormous attention we give to the passing of celebrities, lamented “this hero died with barely anyone’s notice,” correctly implying our priorities are skewed.

So this one’s for Chet Gould, a native of Plymouth, who died two days ago at 95, taking with him proud memories that only those who served could savor.

A member of the Marines’ Fifth Amphibious Corps, he was still a teen when he left “America’s Hometown” for the belly of wartime hell in the Pacific, fighting in Saipan, Tinian, Guam, all brutal bloodbaths held as sacred by every leatherneck.

And he also had a stop on the island of Iwo Jima, where 6,000 Americans perished.

“It was hot, uncomfortable, and traipsing through all that black volcanic ash wasn’t easy,” he once recalled. “All we were concerned with was digging a hole and getting into it, covering our heads and shoulders, but as fast as we dug, the ash would come back into the hole, making it seem like a losing cause.”

But Iwo Jima was very much a winning cause, forever symbolized by the photo of six Marines raising the American flag atop Mount Suribachi.

Gould would later be called upon to retrieve that flag for use in a traveling war bond tour.

“So up we went,” he remembered. “It didn’t have metal grommets; it was tied to a pole with a rope that had been part of (medic) Doc Bradley’s equipment, used to drag soldiers out of harm’s way. I undid the rope, stuck the flag under my jacket, and we descended as fast as we could because we were open targets for snipers. To me, it was just an assignment, doing my duty, doing what I had to do.”

After the war he settled in Texas where, when he died Saturday, he was in the 70th year of marriage to his beloved Mary Ann.

“His memory was disappearing,” his nephew Michael noted. “But when we saw a vacant stare, when it seemed nobody was home, we’d mention the war or Iwo Jima and suddenly a light would come on. We’d use those memories as a tool to bring him back to us. It was a part of his life that was very important to him.”